New Delhi: Rahul Gandhi and other opposition leaders on Tuesday congratulated Prime Minister Narendra Modi for winning the “world famous Kotler Presidential Award”. Perhaps not quite in the same spirit as several BJP leaders and ministers have over the past two days.
“I want to congratulate our PM, on winning the world famous “Kotler Presidential Award”! In fact it’s so famous it has no jury, has never been given out before and is backed by an unheard of Aligarh company,” the Congress president tweeted, tongue firmly in cheek.
RJD leader Tejashwi Yadav, also a sharp Modi critic, re-tweeted Rahul Gandhi with his own message showering PM Modi with “koti-koti badhai” for the “unparalleled, unusual and amazing” award.
Soon it was Left leader Sitaram Yechury’s turn: “My personal congratulations to Narendra Modi for winning the world’s ‘first-ever’ ‘very confidential award’. No one else could have won this award.”
He posted the tweet with a link to a story on The Wire investigating the award and questioning who was on the jury. It quoted one Tauseef Zia Siddiqui, calling himself the representative of Philip Kotler, as saying: “It’s a very confidential award”.
An image put out by the government shows PM Modi receiving the “first-ever Philip Kotler Presidential award” from members of the World Marketing Summit India, which is known to give awards in marketing and management. The award focuses on the triple bottom-line of ‘People, Profit and Planet’, which will be offered annually to the leader of a nation,” a Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) statement said.
“His selfless service towards India, combined with his tireless energy has resulted in extraordinary economic, social and technological advances in the country,” said the citation.
Smriti Irani, who was among the first to congratulate the Prime Minister on receiving the award, hit back at Rahul Gandhi, saying: “Rich !!! Coming from a person whose illustrious family decided to confer the ‘Bharat Ratna’ on themselves.”
In her congratulatory tweet on Monday, she had called the award a matter of great pride for India.
